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Sunday, September 20, 2009

Latin America

US Militarism in Latin America: The Hypocrisy of Hillary Clinton

by José Reinaldo Carvalho

Using the old method of blaming the victim, the Secretary of State of the United States, Hillary Clinton, said she was "troubled" by what she considered an arms race in South America (sic) and referred explicitly to arms purchases by Venezuela. Extrapolating the limits of diplomacy, US Secretary suggested that the country of Bolivar provides weapons to insurgent groups.

Such diversionary and hypocrite tactics has been used by Colombian President Álvaro Uribe when he tried, at the latest summit of UNASUR, shuffling the cards and present them as the same arms purchases by Venezuela, the military accord between Brazil and France and installation of seven military bases in the United States in Colombia.

The current government of US imperialism has no moral authority to refer critically to the "arms race" in Latin America or elsewhere. For the American superpower is the biggest instigator of wars of aggression and militarism in the world today. Its military spending beyond the $ 500 billion, its military bases, more than eight hundred, are spread across all continents in more than one hundred countries. Its armed wing to Europe and the entire North Atlantic area, NATO expands eastward and acts of war campaigns in Central Asia. Its naval fleets sail the seas in the outside world, wielding sea power as strategic design for world domination. Its military commanders, placed in strategic areas, continue to fulfill the role of pro-and consulates in major foreign policy players in the United States, which coincides with the policies of security and defense. In fact, if Mrs. Clinton was a genuine multilateralism, as the Democratic Party is pleased to introduce itself, and should be protesting against this phenomenon that looms jeopardizes militarism and decreases diplomacy. As for nuclear weapons, the United States continues to impose to the world an odious monopoly in the hands of a private club and a worrying rush to an overwhelming priority, with plans to install missile shield in Eastern Europe. Iraq and Afghanistan are still on fire, massacred by the armed forces of the United States.

The audacity of the declaration of the charge of the government's foreign policy of the United States becomes even more evident before the increase in for-interventionist militarism represented by the decision to deploy seven military bases in Colombian territory and the revival of the Fourth Fleet of the US Navy, made the lights out of the previous government, but that the government of President Obama gave no sign that it will withdraw.

This is where the danger lies for Latin America, living a new political framework, marked by the advancement of democratic processes and popular anti-imperialist. The Latin Americans are carrying out new political experiences, advancing in achieving social and political accomplishments, consolidating its integration and creating a difficult situation to reverse. The world has changed and there is no place for politics in Washington or gunboats for arrogance or hypocrisy in terms of foreign policy.

The statements of Hillary Clinton should sound for us, anti-imperialists and defenders of the cause of peace, as a warning sign. There should be no room for illusions. The installation of military bases in Colombia and the existence of Fourth Fleet are genuine threats to the sovereignty of all Latin American countries and an attempt to intimidate the revolutionary processes such as that underway in Venezuela.

Venezuela, like Brazil, have the right to re-equip its armed forces for purposes of deterring threats and national defense. The integration processes are taking forward work in this field also in the Council of Defense of South America, which requires the rejection of US intervention and the attempt to use the thug regime in Colombia as a bridgehead to perpetrate attacks in our region.

Translation courtesy of the Communist Party, South Africa.

José Reinaldo Carvalho is Secretary of International Relations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Brazil _PCdoB and Director of Cebrapaz – Brazilian Center for Solidarity to Peoples and Struggle for Peace.